


Friendly Ghosts

by suzannahbee123



Series: Ghosts Series [1]
Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, The Punisher (TV 2017)
Genre: Explicit Language, Platonic Female/Male Relationships, Platonic Relationships, Vigilantism, mild violence, possible future relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-03
Updated: 2018-11-03
Packaged: 2019-08-17 02:56:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16508033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/suzannahbee123/pseuds/suzannahbee123
Summary: You’re a detective who does some light vigilante work on the side. One night, you meet some new people who just want to talk…





	Friendly Ghosts

You’d started your career working as a barmaid in some run down dive bar when you were a “mature” looking 19 trying to pass for 21 with your, obviously, fake ID. You saw a lot of bad people making their way through that bar. Drunks, drug dealers, good cops and bad cops, men that would drop mysterious looking pills in women’s drinks, women that would deliberately flirt with men that they didn’t come in there with, just so they could watch a fight between their boyfriend and some other big guy.

People were the worst.

Two years of this and seeing just how awful the human race could be, you looked yourself in the mirror and decided to choose. Become part of the solution or part of the problem?

Well, you reasoned, why limit yourself to one?

***

Almost ten years later, and you thought you were managing to balance the two sides of your personality pretty well. You were a detective with the New York State Police, bouncing between Homicide, Vice and Narcotics. This wasn’t because no department wanted you, even though you _were_ a trigger happy live wire, it was because you were focused and driven and every time you strolled through a departments doors, whatever big case they were working on would work through to its conclusion much quicker. Drug Lords, Arms Dealers, Human Traffickers and Cold Blooded Murderers would find themselves behind bars and no one ever questioned how that had happened so quick.

This was New York. Mysterious coincidences happen all the time.

Honestly, you weren’t driven by some horrific past trauma or some crazy sense of civic duty. It was just that… well, the rush of playing both sides of the law and actually making a difference was too much of an addiction.

So, this morning, you walked into the precinct, humming softly to yourself as you grab your coffee and nab a muffin from the pile provided, (blueberry and not chocolate, sadly), and make your way to your desk.

You’re sorting through paperwork when you hear the conversation.

“Yeah, probably HYDRA.”

“HYDRA? Didn’t the Avengers get rid of them?”

“An organisation like that? Are you kidding? They have cells all over the damn place.”

“And they’re bringing this shipment in, when?”

“Not sure, we gotta get out on the street and get more intel, then I can get authorisation from the Captain to take these motherfuckers down.”

You listen for a little longer, making notes silently. Then, humming gently, you pack up your stuff and announce you have to go and chase a lead.

You were not surprised when no one stopped you.

***

Two nights later and you’re at a busy looking warehouse, watching through binoculars at the staggering amount of activity that was going on.

Men dressed in black and armed with some pretty scary looking artillery were patrolling around the border and checking every person, vehicle and box that came in or out of the property.

There were large crates everywhere which were being slowly loaded onto the three large trucks which had “Pete’s Bakery” emblazoned on the sides.

“Bakery.” You scoff. “My ass.” You looked through the binoculars again and made another note on the patrol patterns and possible weak spots. A weak plan started in your mind but, annoyingly, this looked like something that would need more than one person to bring this place down.

Two problems there: you had no evidence, you weren’t supposed to be here and any intel that you had gathered wouldn’t hold up in court because of it, so, there was no point in calling for backup.

Second problem: This intel had come too late, whatever they were about to transport was about ready to go and you didn’t have time to waste but you couldn’t go in there alone and-

“Hey. We can take it from here.”

You jumped, pulled your gun out, spun around and faced the deep voiced male, all in the space of two seconds. Adrenaline coursed through you, making your hands shake lightly and your breaths come in pants, “What?! “We”?! Who the hell is _“we”?!”_

_Surely that is the least important thing you need to be worrying about right now?! He’s HYDRA! KILL HIM!_

“I’m not HYDRA.”

You stared at the man in shock. Tall, bright ice blue/grey eyes, and with chestnut brown hair that brushed his, stupidly, sharp jawline. There was something familiar about him but you weren’t concerned with how attractively dangerous he was, no.

You were more worried about the huge fucking gun he sported. And, now you were looking a bit closer, the ridiculous amount of knives he had strapped to him (and there were probably more that you couldn’t see).

“ _Not_ HYDRA?! Well, who the _fuck_ are you then?! Actually, y’know what?!” The adrenaline had calmed now and your hands were steady as you pointed the gun directly over his heart, “Put your hands behind your head and get to your knees. I’m arresting you for carrying a goddamn arsenal on you.”

The man didn’t budge an inch, just quirked his lips up in a semi smile (this semi smile did not transform the beautiful face into something sinfully sexy, oh no it did not), before whispering, “Y’might want t’cover your ears, doll.”

“Doll?!” You screech indignantly, “Who the _fuck_ are you calling d-!”

_BOOM!_

You were sent flying forward as the force of the explosions behind you came at your back in a hot rush. There was a weird slow motion moment where you looked into the dangerous strangers eyes and he actually chuckled at your look of shock, before you fell face first into the dirt.

“What the hell…” You murmur, shaking your head to clear the ringing.

“He’s better at explosives than me.” The strangers deep voice said softly and you could hear and feel him moving behind you, grabbing your wrists and tying them behind your back.

“My partner does the big entrance and I come in with the clean up. Gotta get to it now, doll. I’ll be back with my partner in a short while and we’ll go’n get coffee, alright?”

“Untie me.” You growled sinisterly, right before breathing in some dirt and coughing and spluttering and basically ruining the dangerous vibe you had been trying to give off. The man gave you a look of pity before turning you over and placing you back against a nearby tree.

“Nah. Don’t worry, doll. I’ll be back in a while, just gotta keep you safe n’ sound until then. We been watching you and have a proposition, sweetness. Catch ya in a few!” The jerk laughed and patted the top of your head before running off, the sound of his heavy footsteps being drowned out by his gleeful yell of, “YOU FUCKERS MISSED ME OR WHAT?!”

***

A couple of hours later and the sounds of violence had died down but your temper had gone into overdrive, not least because you had had a moment of clarity and remembered where the hell you had seen the mysterious stranger.

The Winter Soldier. AKA James Buchanan “Bucky” Barnes.

“Bucky” had been kind if a big deal a few years back, some sort of master assassin for HYDRA who had, apparently, been brainwashed and forced into it since World War Two. There had been rumours that he had broken free and was now roaming the world but you had never tried to find out for sure.

Heat like _that_ you did not need, fuck that very much.

Except, there he had been, looking incredible for someone who was about a century old, casually tying you up and taking on a HYDRA base for you like it was No Big Fucking Deal™

And now, here you were, tied up like a poor, helpless civilian. Like a chump. Like a dumb bitch who couldn’t take care of themselves and-

The sound of cheerful voices and footsteps stopped your struggling and you stretched your neck to peer around the tree trunk and yell at the people coming, “Hey!! You asshole!! Get over here and let me go! You let me go, or, I’ll-”

“Or you’ll what, sweetheart?”

You stop struggling and screaming at the touch of cold steel at your neck and the sound of a deep and scary growl at your ear. This person _wasn’t_ Bucky.

“I….”

“Leave her alone, Castle. We agreed to talk to her, remember?”

Bucky came into view, smirk playing on his lips as he took in your predicament, “Sorry about him, doll face, he has trust issues that make mine look like something casual.”

You wanted to roll your eyes but the knife still held firm at your neck. Annoyingly, terror always had rendered your spunk and sarcasm completely useless. A very _frustrating_ setback.

“Frank! Let her go, asshole!”

The big body behind you huffed in annoyance and he moved to stand next to Bucky and you tried not to start yelling again.

Frank Castle stood next to Bucky Barnes and in that moment you were absolutely fucking terrified.

“So, sweetheart,” Frank Castle asked you in a deep growly voice. “Y’wanna hear about how two ghost stories teamed up and turned into whatever the opposite of Casper is?”

At this point you would do almost anything to keep them talking. Not because their voices were sinful, dark and sexy (even though they fucking _were_ , dammit to hell), but because you realised, in a scary moment of clarity, you had never been this out of your depth in your whole life.

Before you could respond with an eager nod, however, Barnes turned in confusion to Castle, “Casper? What’s that?”

“He’s a friendly ghost.” Castle responded. Bucky continued to look confused and scratched at his head with the tip of a knife that had appeared as if out of nowhere.

 _“We’re_ ghosts! Y’remember? Because we’re dead?” Castle yelled in exasperation, “And we _ain’t_ friendly?!”

“Yeah, but-”

“Goddamn it, man. You ruined the mood.” Castle interrupted Barnes, pouting like a child.

“Okay, okay, so, you two dead ghosts are together…why? _And why’m I tied to a fucking tree because of it?!”_ You shriek, legs flailing against the dirt in indignation.

“Well, doll, see, we found each other when we was both tryin’ to take out a shipment of weapons that was comin’ inbound to New York Harbour and, well-”

“We hit it off.” Castle said completely deadpan, crossing those bulky arms across his chest and you almost smiled. Almost.

“Well, yeah, because you snuck up on me and tried to knock me the fuck out.” Barnes frowned at him, clearly irritated at the interruption.

Rolling his eyes, Castle sighed and turned to him, “Yeah. I know. That’s what I fuckin’ meant, y’know… with the hitting?”

“Ohhh! Yeah, I get ya, pal.” Barnes smiled and turned back to you and you sat up a bit, starting to feel oddly at ease with these two. Which, of course, was dumb as fuck.

But… they were so pretty and silly…

“Anyway, so, we fought, y’know? Like…” Barnes seemed to ponder on what words would be most appropriate for a moment, “Well, like a couple of ghosts, I guess. ‘Cause we was so quiet.”

You smiled at him in encouragement, ignoring Castle who was trying to smother his laughter.

“Anyway, after fighting and Frank actually getting a _few_ decent hits in on me, we realised we were on the same side and that the assholes we were going to take out still hadn’t even realised we were there so, I looked to Frank, right?”

You were riveted listening to this story, it sounded so ridiculous but so endearing at the same time… maybe you had a head injury. If you got out of this alive, you should get it checked out… maybe take some of that leave your captain kept on insisting on, go visit somewhere warm with a beach, maybe.

“Hey, you listening to me?!”

You jerked out of your musings, “I’m sorry! My head hurts and…” You quailed under the glare they gave you, “I’m listening, please carry on.”

They both glower but, oddly, it was Castle who stood up for you, “Go on, man. I think she really is just feelin’ the stress here. Ain’t often you get blown up by two dead guys.”

“Huh. I guess.” Bucky shrugged, shaking his head and taking a breath before continuing again, “So, as I was _sayin’”_ another small pout in residual annoyance, “I turns to Frank and we’re both breathin’ heavy but, me? Not so much.”

Frank rolled his eyes.

“And it’s like we both understand each other, right? I know who he is, ‘cause I been doin’ research an’ he knows who I am for the same damn reason so we know that takin’ out people who want to ruin innocent lives is somethin’ both of us are uniquely equipped to deal with.”

You’re listening intently. Headache gone, completely. And you feel… invigorated. Alive. The story of these two ex soldiers, both betrayed and broken in some way or form, coming together to do the shit that others wouldn’t do… it resonated within you.

“I looked at Frank, and he looks at me and I say, **“Should we let them know we’re coming?”** And he says-”

 **“Where’s the fun in that?”** Frank Castle finished Bucky’s sentence, staring down at you. There was silence for a moment, heavy with things not being spoken.

You weren’t an ex Marine or an ex tortured assassin, so, you broke first.

“Well, I’m happy you two found each other, but, what’s that got to do with me?”

“So,” Bucky said after a moment, “We take out those guys and call it in anonymously… and that’s when we get our first look at _you_ , even though we didn’t pay too much mind at first.”

“We saw you and your boys take care of business and off we went to grab a burger and make plans.” Frank chuckled, “Y’gotta make sure you eat when makin’ plans, sweetheart. Helps ya think.”

“We decided to stick together. We don’t always see eye to eye, but, we get the job done. We have a system going on.”

“Oh, yeah?” You ask Bucky, “How so?”

“Well, we do a rotation, see? One week, we do something that I pick. Next week, we do something Frank picks. Third week, it’s potluck and then-”

“Yeah and on Wednesdays we wear fuckin’ pink, Barnes, she gets it.” Frank growled. You waited for Bucky to question the reference but he shrugged.

“I love Mean Girls.”

Your eyes widen in surprise, “Ooohhhh… kaaay.” Again, you shuffle, your neck was hurting from staring up at them and your wrists were starting to chafe. “Listen, I appreciate you guys not killing me, but-”

You shut up in a big hurry when Frank Castle kneels down in front of you, his switchblade open in front of his face.

“Listen, girl. We been up and down this state, and recently, all we see when we go somewhere is _you_. Now, logically, I know you ain’t bad news, you’re doin’ the thing that _we_ want to do to clean up the filth in this city, right? But, see, we, Bucky and I?” Frank gestured between him and Barnes and you nodded, “We been trained, we been betrayed, we been destroyed by these people. Alright? I _know_ why we’re doin’ this! You though? What’s in it for you?”

“I want to make them pay.”

You say it so quickly that it stuns them into silence but it’s like the words are being pulled from you and you can’t stop them, “I want all the people who think they can get away with bad stuff to pay, but I want them to pay in the right way. I work with the police and, for all the bad ones that are there, I know there are good cops, good lawyers, good judges… I want the bad guys to get the justice they deserve and I want to be able to sleep at night when I give it to them.”

You hang your head and don’t look at them. You feel better for saying it all out loud but you start to tremble in fear. With that rush of truth, you’ve just condemned them and their actions… basically, you’ve just sealed your death penalty and-

Hands under your armpits dragging you to your feet and spinning you around so you face the tree makes you start babbling pathetically, “No! No, please don’t kill me! I’m sorry! I didn’t mean that you two are bad people, just-”

Your wrists were suddenly free and the hands at your arms were gone. Slowly, you turned and faced the two incredibly dangerous men and gulped. “You’re letting me go?”

“In a minute.” Frank growled, but there was a very small smile playing on his lips. Bucky looked at him and Frank shrugged and made a “go on” gesture with his chin towards you.

“You still wanna hear our proposition, doll?”

Rubbing your wrists to get the feeling back into your hands, you look between them, back and forth. Common sense was telling you to run as far and as fast as possible until you could call in reinforcements to come and arrest them.

Logic told you this was stupid, they would catch you and kill you if you pulled something like that.

Your gut said that if they had wanted you dead Bucky would’ve done it easy from his position behind you, he had had a drop on you and, instead of quickly killing you with a shot in the skull, he had talked to you and didn’t lay a finger on you (he had laughed at you when the bomb went off and tied you up which had been _not cool,_ however.)

Finally, curiosity won out and you replied, “As long as you’re not going to kill me once you’re done talking…sure.”

“We both know that we, uh… the world isn’t goin’ to just forgive us and let us move on, and, after everything the world has done to us, we honestly don’t care about it’s opinions, we just want to make it better, in any small way, before we punch out.”

“And we figure you can help with that.” Frank, once again, interrupted Bucky but you had a feeling that this was commonplace for them. They seemed to have a deep understanding of each other.

“And… what does this have to do with me?” Your heartstrings tugged at the casual mention of “punching out”.

They both moved closer, flanking you, but, you didn’t feel cornered, you felt like you had your support in place… protected…

“We want you to work with us… or us to work with you, y’know, whatever way around makes you feel more comfortable, I guess.” Frank remarks and you shoot him a look.

“You know that what I do, after office hours anyway, isn’t big time spy/Marine/assassin stuff, right? I go in l, get some intel, have some clumsy fights with some random guys and plant the evidence on them? I don’t know how much help I can be.”

“We’ll train you.” Bucky answers, simply. “Because of how we take some of these guys out… we know that sooner or later we’re going to mess up and be the reason a criminal can walk free, because we didn’t play by the rules. We need you to help us toe that line, Y/N.”

“You gonna help us or what? We still gotta call the cops on this place.”

You smile at Franks surly tone and look to the stars, contemplating life, the universe and everything, wondering how you were the one to catch these two, pretty, silly, deadly do gooders eyes and why they thought you could help them… really, it was the other way around… things would be so much simpler with a Marine and Ex-Assassin in your corner.

“Okay.” You look to the floor and roll your shoulders and neck, “Didn’t you say something about coffee? And I’ll need one of those burgers, too. Can’t make plans without eating.”

The smiles that lit up Bucky Barnes and Frank Castles faces shone brighter than the moon.


End file.
